


admiration in falling asleep

by viscrael



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Domestic Fluff, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Trans Male Character, Trans Yuri Plisetsky, bg sara/mila, trans yurio is my JAM so its there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-09-09 04:43:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8876464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viscrael/pseuds/viscrael
Summary: Rooming with Otabek is fine. It really is—they’re best friends, Otabek is the perfect roommate, and there’s nothing about each other that they don’t already know to make it weird.
(Except Yuri hadn’t known that Otabek walks around only in his pajama bottoms in the morning, or what he smells like right out of the shower, or that he likes his coffee with two sugars and nothing else, or that he has a knack for losing the television remote regardless of where he puts it, or that he keeps his keys on his nightstand and nowhere else, or that he opens the blinds half-way first thing in the morning to let the sunrise in…)
So it’s fine. It really is. Yuri likes this arrangement, and no matter how many looks Mila gives him, that’s the truth.
He just wishes it sounded like all of the truth.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i!! love!! otayuri!!! theyre so cute and good!!!! go d b less !!!!!
> 
> i also rlly love the trans yurio hc so theres some of that here too (warning for mild transphobia from administrators)
> 
> also idk why theyre going to the same college when they literally dont live in the same country but?? pretend, somehow, that they do. also i dont mention ice skating here so also pretend this is an au where they Dont ice skate (or pretend its canon timeline and that i just didnt mention it, whichever floats ur boat)
> 
> title from the predatory wasp of the palisades is out to get us bc thats my Favorite song rn and im bad at titles so i literally just name everything after songs rip

Yuri slips back into consciousness slowly, feeling the weight underneath him shift. When he blinks his eyes open, he’s met with the sight of his roommate standing in front of the couch, looking down at him. Otabek’s hair is mussed and sticking up at wrong angles, his pajamas wrinkled, but he looks wide awake.

“Sorry,” Otabek says. “Did I wake you up?”

Yuri grumbles something incoherent and sits up grudgingly. The TV is stuck on the ending credits of the movie he and Otabek were supposed to be watching. He must have fallen asleep during it, he realizes slowly.

“Mm, yeah,” he admits, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He’s a light sleeper. Otabek must have been trying to get up, stuck with Yuri’s head in his lap for the past two hours.

Otabek doesn’t respond and leaves the room, disappearing down the hallway and returning a moment later with a large throw blanket slung over his arm. Before Yuri can ask what it’s for, the blanket is being wrapped around his shoulders gently, and Otabek sits back down on the couch next to him. He places a pillow in his lap.

“Here,” he says. “Go back to sleep. I’ll put something else on.”

Yuri doesn’t question it. He lays down, pulling the blanket tightly around himself, warm and comfortable. As he’s falling asleep, he feels hands combing through his hair.

 

\--

 

“How’s the roomie?” Mila asks, sipping her cup of coffee delicately. It’s got her name scribbled in black sharpie on the front, the _i_ dotted with a heart.

She’s been using this specific coffee place as her and Yuri’s meeting spot for the past few weeks under the excuse that it’s right in between their classes and therefore most convenient for both of them. But Yuri’s not an idiot, and he sees the way Mila smiles at the one cashier, the girl with dark hair and a cheery greeting—the same one who dots her _i_ ’s with hearts and looks a little too happy to see Mila every time they enter. He wonders how long it’ll be before Mila gathers the courage to ask her out. He thinks she should figure out her name first, though.

“He’s fine,” Yuri says, stirring his own hot chocolate slowly. He doesn’t like coffee very much, but this place sells good pastries so he doesn’t complain.

Mila hums in response, setting her cup down and tapping her painted nails on the table. She looks at him as if waiting for something more, but he only blinks back at her.

“How many years has it been now?” she asks. She’s trying to sound nonchalant, but it’s clear that she’s trying to get something from him. Yuri’s eyes narrow.

“Since what?”

“Since you two met.”

“Uh…” He thinks about it. Well, they _met_ when they were kids, but they didn’t start talking until Yuri was a teenager. He shrugs. “I don’t know. A few years, I guess.”

Mila hums again.

He glares at her. “What?”

“Nothing.” But she’s smiling—the one that means she’s thinking something, something he’s probably not gonna like. “Nothing at all.”

“Then stop looking at me like that!”

“I’m just looking at you, Yuri. Am I not allowed to look at my friend?”

“Not like that.”

She only keeps smiling. “I was just going to say that it’s weird to think that you’ve only known each other for a few years now. It’ll be three this December, right? Since you became friends?”

“I guess. I don’t keep track.” He pauses. “What do you mean it’s _‘weird_ ’?”

“He’s just been such a huge part of your life. Thinking that there was a time when you didn’t have each other…” She shrugs. “It’s weird, that’s all.”

“He’s not a _huge_ part of my life…”

“You live together.”

Yuri takes a sip of his hot chocolate, refusing to answer to that.

It’s not that he isn’t aware of how important Otabek is to him—no, he’s all too aware of that. Like Mila said, they _are_ roommates, and if it weren’t for Otabek, Yuri’s dorm situation would be…bad. But he isn’t used to having it pointed out how important they are to each other, or how big of a part Otabek plays in his life, and especially not by other people. It doesn’t help that the expression Mila is wearing is one like she knows something he doesn’t.

“So?” he mumbles.

“Nothing, nothing,” Mila says again and doesn’t push the topic. But it still sounds like there’s more.

 

\--

 

Otabek is twenty-one, and he’s been living in his own apartment for two years now. His parents bought it for him when he was old enough to live off campus from his university. It’s small, not made for more than two people at most, but it’s cozy, and Otabek’s the kind to clean every Sunday morning so it’s always kept in good condition.

Yuri hadn’t chosen this university _because_ of Otabek, but his attendance definitely isn’t a downside. He’d feared the dorm situation ever since he entered high school, knowing that it would be a struggle and that if he wasn’t lucky, he’d have to deal with some…pretty uncomfortable situations. The university wasn’t happy when he said he wanted to stay in the boys’ dorm, citing his birth certificate’s stamped _F_ as reason for complaint despite the years of hormones, legal name change, and future plans for surgery. His driver’s license even had the marker changed to _M_ , and yet the university’s administration had fought with him for a long time on what dorm to stick him in.

When the birth certificate argument became overused, they started saying that it would be impossible to find a roommate for Yuri that would accept him or that would _want_ to room with him. “It would make the other boys uncomfortable” was another excuse they bothered with.

A few months of this and Otabek finally stepped in, offering his apartment as a solution.

“There’s a guest room you can use,” he’d said over dinner one night, running his finger along the edge of his glass. He looked deceptively calm, but Yuri knew him well enough to see the anxiety he was hiding. “If you’re okay with it, I really don’t mind.”

They were together at any given moment anyway; living together couldn’t be _that_ much different, right? Yuri said yes, and the administrators breathed a collective sigh of relief. With that issue out of the way, Yuri could focus more on the rest of his college experience.

Rooming with Otabek is fine. It really is—they’re best friends, Otabek is the perfect roommate, and there’s nothing about each other that they don’t already know to make it weird.

(Except Yuri _hadn’t_ known that Otabek walks around only in his pajama bottoms in the morning, or what he smells like right out of the shower, or that he likes his coffee with two sugars and nothing else, or that he has a knack for losing the television remote regardless of where he puts it, or that he keeps his keys on his nightstand and nowhere else, or that he opens the blinds half-way first thing in the morning to let the sunrise in…)

So it’s fine. It really is. Yuri likes this arrangement, and no matter how many looks Mila gives him, that’s the truth.

He just wishes it sounded like _all_ of the truth.

 

\--

 

Yuri loves riding with Otabek.

He’s always loved it. Even when they were just becoming friends that was his favorite way to spend time together: speeding down the road, the world around them a blur of colors, greens and blues and bright yellow lights as Yuri felt the thrum of the motorcycle beneath them, leaning forward with his chest pressed against Otabek’s back, warm and inviting and _safe._

(Otabek always feels safe. He always has. He still does.)

The adrenaline rush doesn’t go away, and Yuri’s love for it hasn’t diminished over the years. Although he has a driver’s license, Yuri doesn’t have a car and he hates public transportation, so Otabek ends up taking them places whenever he can. That’s his favorite time of the day, when they’re climbing on the bike, Yuri slipping his helmet on before Otabek kicks off. They can’t talk when they’re riding, at least not very well—the roar of the wind and their helmets keep it from being practical. But there’s never any weirdness to the silence, never anything but a pleasant companionship around them. Yuri never feels the need to fill the quiet, only tightening his arms around Otabek’s middle in lieu of talking. That’s all the communication they need like this.

Through Otabek’s jacket, Yuri can feel the warmth of his body, the height of being alive. Sometimes, when it’s summer and Otabek’s forgone his jacket and left himself only in a tank top, Yuri can feel his heart beating in his chest, his pulse rising with every mile per hour they go. Like that, it feels like he’s connected with his bike, like they’re linked creatures, breathing together. That’s another thing that Yuri loves—feeling them move together. Feeling that heartbeat.

 

\--

 

Otabek doesn’t date.

Yuri doesn’t know why; it’s clearly not an issue of him being _unable_ to get a date. He’s had several different people—guys _and_ girls—ask him out just in the past year, but each time, Yuri’s seen him turn them down. When asked about it, either by Mila or Yuri himself, he only shrugs and says that he wasn’t interested.

“There’s no point in going out with someone I’m not interested in,” he says. “It would only waste both of our time.”

As far as Yuri knows, he’s only had one partner before, a girl he dated for a few months back when he and Yuri had just become friends, when Otabek was freshly eighteen. The relationship hadn’t lasted long. When asked about that, he’d given a similar response.

“My feelings for her went away. It wouldn’t have been fair to either of us to keep the relationship going after that.”

Yuri sort of gets it—that Otabek doesn’t want to be with someone if he doesn’t want to _be_ with them. That makes sense. What he doesn’t get is why Otabek has no interest in other people romantically, if it’s that he’s not found someone or if he’s just…not interested in relationships in general.

Yuri doesn’t know why the possibility of that last one being true bothers him so much.

They don’t talk about relationships or things like this in general. The two of them have never really _needed_ to talk about that, so it’s a surprise when they’re in the kitchen, Otabek stirring something in a pan for dinner, and Yuri brings it up.

“Do you ever think about dating?”

Yuri’s leaning against the counter, his arms crossed over his chest. He’s not wearing his binder right now—he rarely wears it around the apartment, and especially not when they’re just relaxing—but the pressure over his chest is familiar, comforting. Otabek glances at Yuri from the corner of his eye curiously and continues stirring.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I think it depends on what you mean by that.”

“I mean…” Yuri huffs. “Like, do you ever think about…who you’d want to date? And if you want to even be dating someone in the future? Or now, I guess.” He bites his lip to keep from adding _I don’t know_ to the end. He really _doesn’t_ know. The question had been blurted out with no prior thought into what to ask after that.

Otabek nods, still looking at the pan. He reaches over and throws something into the food, some spice Yuri doesn’t bother asking about. Yuri usually isn’t the one doing the cooking.

“Yeah, sometimes,” Otabek admits.

“Oh.”

There’s a pause. “Do you?”

Yuri shrugs, trying for nonchalant, but the motion comes out more strained than he wants it to. “I don’t know. I guess so. That’s what most eighteen-year-olds think about, right? Dating and whatever?” _Sex_ is tacked on at the end, but only in his head. He doesn’t think he could ask about that from Otabek without maybe exploding from embarrassment.

“Most, but not all,” Otabek says. “Um…any…reason for the interest?”

“Mila has a crush on this girl who works at the coffee place she always makes me go to. Neither of them are making a move, though.” That isn’t what Yuri meant to say, but it was the first explanation he could think of. He doesn’t retract it.

“That doesn’t sound like Mila.”

“She’s really weird when it comes to relationships.” Yuri rolls his eyes. “She’s horrible at talking to girls she likes.”

“And you end up playing wingman.”

“And I end up playing wingman,” Yuri agrees. Reluctant wingman, but still her wingman.

There’s a longer pause than before. The sizzle of the pan fills the silence, crackling between them, and Yuri shifts his weight from one foot to the other nervously.

He finally blurts out, “Why don’t you ever date?”

Otabek’s shoulders tense slightly. Yuri thinks it’s from surprise and not discomfort, though—and he’s glad about that.

“I just haven’t found anyone I’m interested in,” he says, shrugging. The motion dissipates the tense in his shoulders, and he moves to turn the stove’s temperature down slightly.

“So if you did, would you ask them out?”

“If I thought h—…they were also interested, yes.”

Yuri catches the slip. He doesn’t comment on it, politely pretending to not have heard. “Oh.”

Otabek glances at him again. When they make eye contact this time, it’s—different. Yuri has to look away first. “Does that surprise you?”

“That you haven’t found anyone?”

He nods.

Yuri uncrosses his arms from his chest and turns around so he’s no longer leaning on the counter, instead coming to stand near the stove. This way he can see Otabek cooking better. “Sort of. I guess I thought you would have said yes to at least _one_ of the thousand suitors.”

“It was three people,” Otabek mumbles.

“Four.”

They look at each other again. Otabek is the first to break eye contact this time. “Right. Four. Still not a thousand.”

“Close.”

It’s small, but Yuri can see the way the corner of his lips twitch up into a smile, soft and safe and barely there. Yuri’s seen a million different versions of Otabek’s smile over the past three years and, unlike with the suitors, that statement isn’t a hyperbole. Yuri doesn’t have a list of favorite smiles, but he thinks if he did, this one—the soft, secret one—might be one of them.

The topic switches, but their conversation doesn’t die off.

 

\--

 

Otabek’s hair is only a little shorter than Yuri’s since he’s started growing it out, but he still seems to have a fascination with Yuri’s hair. Yuri’s kept it shorter, a little shorter even than when they first met, because any longer than right now and he starts getting misgendered in public despite the voice drop and obviously masculine disposition. But it’s long enough that he can put it in a bun or braid it, and the latter seems to be one of Otabek’s favorite pastimes.

They’re watching television in between studying, textbooks open and papers spread out on the coffee table in front of them. Yuri’s sitting on the ground in front of the couch between Otabek’s legs; it’s the easiest position to be in for Otabek to have access to Yuri’s hair. Some newscaster drones on about the week’s temperature while Otabek runs his hands through Yuri’s hair, separating the strands.

“Are you doing a French braid?”

Otabek hums in answer, seemingly too busy with his task to fully respond to Yuri. Yuri turns his attention back to the TV, but it’s difficult when he’s so comfortable, and he feels himself starting to doze off.

“Don’t go to sleep on me,” Yuri hears Otabek tell him, but the deep baritone of his voice only makes it all the more soothing, and Yuri slips into sleep. When he wakes, it’s because Otabek is nudging his side with his feet.

“You’ll hurt your neck sleeping there like that,” Otabek chastises. “I’ll take you to your room if you’re going to pass out.”

Yuri doesn’t answer. He only raises his arms out in invitation, and Otabek pauses, seeming to debate what to do. Yuri waves his arms once in demand, and Otabek sighs, leans down, and picks him up without strain. He carries Yuri to his room like that, but Yuri’s already asleep before he can be laid down.

(He wakes up a few hours later, tucked under the covers with his hair in a loose French braid.)

 

\--

 

Mila finally asks that girl out.

Yuri knows in excruciating detail everything that happens on their date. Her name is Sara; she has beautiful eyes and apparently wore heels and _still_ didn’t quite reach Mila’s height; they went to a dinner and a movie and hung out afterwards, Sara said that she had a great time and would love to get together again soon…

He’s happy for Mila. She’s been pining after that girl for a month a half now, and this is the first time he’s ever seen her _this_ excited about a partner. It’s just that way that Mila gets whenever she talks about romance that Yuri doesn’t like; when she’s done talking about herself (and she takes her sweet time with that one), she gives Yuri that _look_ again, asks slyly about Otabek, and only keeps giving him that look regardless of what answer he gives.

Yuri knows what she’s implying, but he pretends he doesn’t notice and feigns nonchalance no matter what question she asks. He thinks if he keeps giving boring answers, she’ll finally give up asking.

Of course, she doesn’t, and she continues like that, dating Sara and asking Yuri why he _isn’t_ dating anyone.

 

\--

 

So here’s the thing:

Yuri’s not dumb. He knows how he feels, and he knows that Mila knows how he feels, and he knows what it means when he feels like this. He knows how important Otabek is to him and that he’s a huge part of Yuri’s life and that maybe that isn’t normal, and that, alright, so maybe he’s very much okay with waking up to Otabek in the morning, especially on days when he forgets to slip on a shirt before getting out of bed. And maybe he’s alright with falling asleep in Otabek’s lap and letting Otabek play with his hair and having Otabek cook meals for him and going shopping together and discussing getting a cat in the future. He’s okay with the bike rides and the early mornings and the studying together and the way that Otabek smells when he first gets out of the shower. He’s okay with doing laundry together and not feeling like he has to hide himself when he’s at home and knowing that Otabek’s never going to think differently or less of him just because of who he is and who he isn’t. He’s okay with knowing that they might be the most important people in each other’s lives.

He’s okay with all of that.

He’s just not okay with what he needs to do with it.

Yuri’s not dumb. He knows that things could— _will_ change, and that they could change for the worse and never go back. He knows that, knows it all too intimately. That’s the part that he’s not okay with. The part that he fears the way that he feared dorms: slowly, over time, a nagging anxiety in the back of his mind that he’d have to deal with it eventually and that it could end up horrible if he isn’t careful.

Otabek might be the best thing Yuri has in his life. No, scratch that—Otabek _is_ the best thing Yuri has in his life.

It only makes sense that he wouldn’t want to mess that up.

 

\--

 

In the end, it isn’t Yuri that messes that up.

It’s Otabek, although “mess up” is a loose, barely applicable term in this case. They’re on the couch the way that they always are when they have free time away from homework or classes, Otabek laying with his head in Yuri’s lap. Usually it’s the other way around, but Yuri’s okay with this too; he can’t say he minds running his fingers through Otabek’s hair, massaging his scalp gently and watching the way Otabek’s body relaxes slowly with every passing moment they sit like this.

This is the only time that he sees Otabek like this, completely open; vulnerable. In public, he’s not harsh, but he puts up a wall, and Yuri absolutely loves seeing that wall go down when they’re alone like this. That’s another thing he’s okay with.

“Yuri,” Otabek says suddenly. His eyes are still closed, and if he hadn’t spoken, Yuri would’ve thought he was asleep.

“Hmm?”

“You remember our conversation about dating?”

Yuri nods even though the movement is lost to Otabek’s closed eyes. “Yeah.”

“There’s someone I’m interested in.”

The hands in Otabek’s hair falter. Yuri catches himself quickly and continues what he’s doing, hoping his hesitation wasn’t noticed. “Oh. Are you going to ask them out?”

“I think so. I want to.”

“Hmm.”

Otabek’s eyes are still closed. He lets out a soft breath, close to a huff but not all the way there.

“I hope it goes well,” Yuri mumbles, even though somewhere, selfishly, he knows that isn’t true. It’s a horrible thing to think about your best friend, but deep down he doesn’t want it to go well. He doesn’t want Otabek to leave him to date someone, to have his time monopolized by a third party.

“Yeah, me too. I think it will. I’m thinking I have a chance with them,” Otabek continues.

“Mmm,” Yuri hums again in answer.

Otabek’s eyes open and meet Yuri’s. They’re dark brown, flashing gold when the light shining in from their living room window hits him just right. Yuri’s hands stop moving, still in Otabek’s hair.

“Do you think I have a chance?” Otabek asks quietly.

“I think you have a chance with just about anybody,” Yuri answers just as quietly. They’re still looking at each other when he says it, but his face heats up when the answer catches up to him. He looks away quickly. He hadn’t meant to say it like that.

“That’s good that you said that,” Otabek says. He sits up, forcing Yuri to lean back so they won’t knock heads as he shifts, and turns so they’re facing each other on the couch. He asks, as nonchalantly as ever, “Will you go out with me sometime?”

Yuri’s face only heats up more. For a moment, he does nothing but gape, feeling like an idiot with his eyes wide and his face red before he realizes that Otabek is waiting for an answer, and deflating slightly with every second that he neglects speaking.

“Um,” Yuri says eloquently. “On…a date?”

“On a date,” Otabek nods.

“On a date.”

He smiles. Yuri realizes that he’s still not answered, only repeating the same thing and says with a lot more enthusiasm than he’d meant, “Yeah! I mean—yeah, that’d would…I would be okay with that.”

Otabek’s smile only widens. It’s soft, that secret one that Yuri’s fascinated with, only another in the arsenal of things about Otabek that Yuri’s grown to love.

“As long as you’re okay with it,” he says.

Yuri is very much okay with it.

 

\--

 

(Mila has a field day when she hears the news. It’s only a few weeks into their dating that she makes them go on a double date with her and Sara. Yuri is not happy about the insistence; Otabek smiles and says that he’s okay with it either way, and that’s enough for Mila to take as a yes.)

**Author's Note:**

> me, writing this: lets see how many of my favorite tropes i can shove into 4k words before it becomes too obvious that this fic is only a vessel for my miscellaneous and frankly rather scattered otayuri ideas
> 
> also find me on [tumblr](http://calliopin-around.tumblr.com) screaming about yoi

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] Admiration In Falling Asleep](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13798704) by [Annapods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annapods/pseuds/Annapods)




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